110 UKCORDS OF THE AUSTRALIAN MU3EUM. 



douiaii skull in my collection exhibiting mixed Polynesian 

 characters described by Professor David Waterston. 



The table shows that the frontal curve angle, 134°, is less open 

 (that is, the curvature is greater) than in the two Moriori skulls 

 and than in the average of all the Maori skulls, 134-75°. This 

 means that the actual forehead portion is more rounded, less 

 flattt^ned, than among the Morioris and Maoris. The following 

 figures from Cunningham will show how the frontal curvature 

 compares with skulls of Australian aboriginals. In eight males 

 from Victoria the figures for the angles were 134*, 136°, 133°, 

 133°, 130°, 131-5°, 133-5° and 133°, giving a mean of 133°. In 

 five females from Victoria the figures were 130', 132°, 131°, 133° 

 and 126°, giving a mean of 1304°. In ten males from Queens- 

 land the mean was 133°, the extremes being 127*5° and 146*. 

 In two females from Queensland the figures were 125° and 140**. 

 In one South Australian skull the angle was 141°, in a Central 

 Australian 141°, and in a skull from New South Wales also 141°. 

 I measured two aboriginal skulls^almost the first that came to 

 hand, and I find that one gives an angle of 127° and the other 

 an angle of 146° — almost the extremes of roundness and flatness. 



Cunningham is inclined to place more reliance on the results 

 yielded by the index of the frontal curve tiian on the angle of 

 the curve. This index in the Whangarei Skull is larger {i.e., the 

 curving of the bone is greater) than in the two Moriori and the 

 four Maori, and much the same as in the Australian where the 

 means of indices given in Cunningham are 22-4, 23-9, 214, 233 

 and the indices of single skulls are 17-3, 18-4 and 182. In 

 seven Scottish crania (six male and one female) the figures were 

 20-2, 26-2, 221, 25-4, 23-8, 252 and 21-7, giving a mean of 23-7. 



It may be said that the Whangarei Skull in respect to the 

 curving of the frontal bone, comes within the limits of the Aus- 

 tralian which are very wide, corresponds with what is found in 

 some Maoris, Fijians and New Caledonians, and does not difTer 

 greatly from what may be found in individuals belonging to white 

 races. 



Before I had discovered that all the fragments sent to me 

 belonged to one skull, I had made a somewhat extensive inquiry 

 into the occurrence of frontal l)ones liavin;; a longitudinal arc as 

 large as this one. From a consideration of the meastirements 

 made of Australian and South Seas skulls by Turner, Scott 

 Waterston, Duckworth, Klaatsch and others, and of Bainard 

 Davis's descriptions of skulls of Ancient Britons, aboriginal 

 Swedes and panes. Ancient Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Scandi- 

 navians and Romano- liri tons, it appears that frontal bones with 

 a longitudinal arc of 136mm. or over have usually small trans 



